CHAPTER XXXI
A FEW DAYS IN BROUSSA—THE TRUE ISLAM ATMOSPHERE
The Governor who, once more, “comes from Malta,” has detailed a police officer to look after me during the five-days’ visit unexpectedly imposed upon us, since there is no boat leaving before then. My journey from Angora to Constantinople will, therefore, occupy ten days instead of the regulation two or three.
We start out the first thing in the morning and do not return till dusk. I have never visited so many mosques, and their colouring seems even more exquisite than I have found it elsewhere.
Naturally, however, we first went to pay our respects to the Governor, who promised to give me certain special information next day. His konak, however, happened to catch fire soon after we left, and in less than an hour it was reduced to cinders. There was, fortunately, little wind, though, as we watched the flames from our hotel, one could feel no security that it might not spread all over the town and render us, too, homeless.
It was, as it happens, a brigand, descending by chance from the mountains, who had saved the whole town from destruction when the Greeks left it in flames, after demolishing their church and setting fire to their houses. Fifteen surrounding villages were, actually, burnt to the ground. The French proprietress of the hotel told me the town was not ravaged by Ottoman Greeks, but by the Hellenes. Their own Greeks cried bitterly at being compelled to leave, but were terrified into flight, many of them dying at Moudania or on the road.
I heard an amusing story from my Dutch friend in Smyrna which illustrates in what “great respect” the Turkish army has always been held by Greeks. One of their officers, reconnoitring on the hillside, was seen to run back to his men, shouting: “They are coming! They are coming! There are fezes everywhere!” He had caught sight of a field of poppies!
Madame herself is “desolated” by the departure of her Greek servants, and puts no real reliance on the Jews by whom she has been obliged to replace them. Although getting on in years, she is eighty-six, she never dare go to bed before any of her guests, lest someone should ring and obtain no answer. I enjoyed examining, in her visiting book, the signatures and humorous comments of English prisoners, who were with her during hostilities.
Everywhere the Jews are stirring themselves, in and out of their quarters, eager to take on anything abandoned by the Greeks, as shoemakers, plumbers, tradesmen, and labourers of all kinds. Nowhere else, I imagine, could one hear them boasting “I am an Israelite.” Our guests include many Jews, and they are quickly finding their way more than ever into the good graces of the Turks.
I hope they will soon organise the splendid “bathing” one could enjoy at Broussa if only some comfortable rest-place were set up for recovery from the bracing effects of such strong waters. Surely the Baths of Broussa might be promoted into a gold mine!
I wonder if the town is really as old as Angora? In parts it is more dilapidated, as one can see from walking about its deserted streets, so sorely in need of repair, and glancing up at the broken windows on every side. Nevertheless I, personally, delight in the delicate charm of this famous Asiatic city, free from a “Levantine” population and the relics of Byzantium that rather spoil Constantinople.
The celebrated silk factories are not, of course, so picturesque; and the depressing mixture of steam heat, and smell is certainly calculated to make one long for the very latest kind of progressive machinery to replace such unhealthy “human” labour. Here, again, we find Jews and the so-called “Catholics,” have replaced the Greeks; and the proprietors (who are so often Jews) only complain that there are not more hands available.
This means, of course, not enough competition; and wages have risen from thirty to sixty piastres a day. For this reason they miss the Greeks and Armenians, although the new men are equally good workers.
“We have also to employ Turkish women,” they say.
“Are they good?”
“No, very bad. They can work, but have never done so, and have no experience. Yet we must pay sixty piastres for their unskilled labour.”
“Then you are running the factories at a loss, with these high wages?” I asked.
“Oh, no! We ‘make up’ for that by paying the peasants half their old price for the raw silk.”
“Do they complain?”
“No. We tell them that times are bad; which they understand, and accept.”
It is an excellent example of the ease with which almost anyone can make his profit out of the Turk. He is satisfied with so little, and seldom, or never, protests. For years Greeks and Armenians have filled their pockets at his expense. Now we have driven them out of their homes and Jews are quickly filling their place. No wonder they turn on their Christian “protectors,” and resent our “interference.” To them money is the breath of life, and money is more easily made in Turkey than anywhere else in the world.
Whatever prosperity these districts have managed to retain largely depends on the silk-making and the tobacco factories. All the Europeans are, naturally, against any attempts to abolish capitulations. “They are not likely to leave us,” say the Turks, “where else would they be granted ‘capitulations’?”
The bazaar at Broussa has lost none of its Eastern charm, but prices have gone up by leaps and bounds since I was here ten years ago. They will, probably, soon rise still higher when hand-embroidery dies out before the machine-made imitations.
The Central Mosque has been rather disfigured by the over-zealous multiplication of mural texts; but the beautiful fountain preserves the most marked characteristic of all mosques, on which their “appeal” so largely depends. It also contains some very fine specimens of the curious old clocks, which only show Turkish hours.
In the courtyard there are more fountains and many pigeons, and the public letter-writer. Just now he is hard at work for a profitable customer who, one might think, surely knew how to conduct his own correspondence. From my experience as an amateur, doing my best for the Poilus, I should never imagine that letter-writing could be an easy profession.
How well I remember the poor boy (a particularly serious “case”) who asked me to “tell Jeanne” that ... “he was well and happy and enjoying himself. But that some friends had written and told him she had not been faithful, and ‘he didn’t care.’ All the girls were running after him, and the grand ladies, too. He hadn’t any time to think about her.”
He afterwards gave me careful instructions about a P.S. “But I do think of her sometimes.” In another few minutes it was, “I often think of her.” And, finally, “you can tell her that I forgive her, and love her as much as ever.”
Every corner of Broussa reveals the true “Islam” atmosphere; whether you look down on it from the surrounding heights, or wander along its quaint streets and alleys. Everywhere you see latticed windows, mosques, and dervishes’ Tekké. It stands on a wide stretch of marshland, seemingly going on for ever, with its countless rows of skeleton-poplars, that stand out in the blue-grey mist like ghostly sentinels.
I decided there could be no better opportunity to indulge in an adventure I had often contemplated: climb up the highest of all the minarets to reach “the top of the top!” The narrow and winding staircase was sadly in need of repair; but at the long last I found myself on the tiny balcony from which the muezzin daily summons “the faithful” to prayer.
“Do you think I might sing?” I asked. “It would be interesting to know how far the voice carries at this height.”
“As you please,” he answered; but as it was clear that he was decidedly embarrassed, if not shocked, I contented myself with quietly humming Gloria in Excelsis. When I told him the words—“On earth peace, to men of goodwill,” he answered, reverently, “Inch Allah.”
“You see,” I explained, “the muezzin calls the faithful to prayer, I call them to peace.”
As, perhaps, I ought to have foreseen, it proved a far more difficult business to get down those steps than it had been to climb up. Somehow the walls seemed closing in upon me, and the mere idea of starting upon the descent brought on a fit of unmanageable giddiness. My guide promptly offered to carry me, but I did not believe it could be done; and, in any case, I should not wish him to make the attempt. When I have plucked up courage to trust my own feet, they are constantly slipping over the worn stones, and often we find three or four missing altogether; still it would not be possible to jump.
“I am only just in front of you,” said my guide, “if you fall, you will fall on me.”
I ought to have been thoroughly ashamed of myself, but I could only say, “You must let me manage my own way and slide down as best I can.”
I am perfectly comfortable in an aeroplane at an altitude of 10,000 feet; and to this day I have never been able to understand why that minaret made me so giddy.
We visited the tombs of Osman and many of the other Sultans buried in Broussa, the ancient capital of Turkey. The idea of the continual watching of the tomb, and, indeed, the whole attitude of Islam towards death, is full of beauty. One does not wish to believe that the Greeks marched up to this Holy Place with drawn swords, cursing the founder of the Osman Dynasty.
We also drove to the famous Green Mosque, immortalised by Pierre Loti. The actual colour of this fine building is a most wonderful turquoise blue; but, like those jewels, it may, indeed, one day grow green with age. Here Pierre Loti used to write his books, reclining on the magnificent carpets, of which the quality and beauty have defied time itself. On one side stands the large door (replacing the altar) of exquisitely blended green porcelain and delicate gold lettering; on the other, the cool and sparkling fountain. All day long he worked in this hallowed atmosphere; where the invisible mouths of the fountain send out a gorgeous mass of rainbow-hued spray into the sun’s white rays.
The guardian of the mosque, who used to serve coffee and bring Loti’s narghili and arrange the cushions, has been laid to rest near by; and now Loti’s long life is drawing to its close. His best work was done in the mosque at Broussa, as his countless admirers should not forget—the shrine of one of Turkey’s truest friends.
Here, in the East, all may enter God’s House; and it is here that every day, all day long, you see (as, indeed, you may in France) men and women of every sort and condition, unburdening their hearts of joys or sorrows, some carrying a homely parcel, a loaf of bread, or their goods to market; others carrying their little children. No doubt, the mosque—or the church—offers warmth and shelter; but its quiet solemnity must turn our thoughts from all the pettiness of existence, the false pride, and the ugly sin. Nor do those who are, as it were, so thoroughly “at home” in God’s House, pray with any less earnestness or sincerity.
What a contrast to the cathedral at Geneva I visited with a French ex-Ambassadress. We had to send for the caretaker, who unlocked the door for us and locked it up again as we left. Yet this was once a church; holy men had dedicated their genius to make it beautiful, because it was the House of God. It is not God’s House now; only a building where men meet and speak. “Have we, indeed, lost faith in anything,” said my companion, as the door was closed behind us “which of us would God Himself lock out? Are there none left who would pray to Him? To what vain and untrusting materialism will mankind yet lower drift?”
One morning, unable to hold in the interest awakened by a handsome, young Turkish woman with veiled hair, who was sitting near me in the hotel, I, at last, ventured to ask her if she would “excuse my staring,” but “she so much reminds me” of an old friend, Dr. Nihat Réchad.
“He is my brother,” she replied in excellent English, obviously delighted. It appears she had lost touch with him for many years; only knowing that he had been in prison and escaped to join Mustapha Kemal. Now she hoped he must be coming into his own again.
I was glad to tell her how greatly we appreciated Dr. Réchad in London.
Our acquaintance brought me many new pleasures in Broussa, in addition to her own delightful society and her most friendly baby. She introduced me to many of the nicest people in the hotel, and arranged for us to visit the admirable hospitals of Dr. Nazoum, head of the Army Medical Service, who was a friend of her husband’s.
There were two Turkish gentlemen, however (General Kemallidine Pasha and Nourredine Pasha), whom I had been warned not to see, because they were “such bears and hated England”; naturally, having thus had my combative curiosity excited, I eagerly sought for introductions to them. And I could not admit the justice of their condemnation.
General Kemallidine Pasha is about thirty-five, with an honest, open face and merry eyes, that strongly reminded me of my brother; who—though not wounded eighteen times like the Pasha—has been so frequently sewn up as to present to the world, so I tell him, no more than a figure of “threads and patches.” He apologised for offering his left hand, obviously pleased when I said, “it did not matter which of a hero’s hands one is privileged to shake.” When I said that I was sorry to hear he disliked my country, he gave the only explanation I ever obtained from a Turk: “It is because I once loved her so well!”
And for that I have only one answer, provided for me by Mr. D——, who was in Constantinople all through the war, and is convinced that the English were, throughout, entirely misled by Greek and Armenian dragomen. He, himself, would never trust these men to translate any newspaper article for him. “Their work may be, and frequently is, quite correct, but they are clever enough to impart an entirely different meaning from one language to the other; for example, with the word “iltehoc,” how can that word be translated with all its shades of meaning?
“The most dangerous Englishmen,” he said, “were irresponsible young colonels of twenty-five, the familiar “temporary gentlemen,” whose sudden access to power and responsibility has, on other occasions, led Great Britain into adventures she cannot, afterwards, disown. One must regret, but can scarcely in fairness condemn, some of these brave boys from the “edge of beyond” in Canada or Australia, who, of course, are absolutely ignorant of Moslem customs, and, by training, rather aggressively impatient of the slow ways of old England herself.
There were Turks of a very inferior type to be found to help them, as it would be dishonest to deny. Those who made themselves personna grata to the Allies, and enemies to the Nationalists, because they would sink to any calumny or blackmail to secure a “job,” or to keep one.
It is, indeed, high testimony to the personality of General Harington that, despite all the crimes committed “in his name,” General Kemallidine, Ismet Pasha and Nourredine Pasha are unanimous in their high tribute.
Our empire is built on confidence in the “Man on the Spot.” It has given us our unrivalled position and a reputation for justice and generosity none can rival. But, with the wrong men, it may have most disastrous results; and, in Turkey, we still want to know who sent Turkey’s élite to Malta?
Kemallidine Pasha gallantly summed up his acceptance of my explanations.... “Now I see the difference between an English lady and an English ‘temporary gentleman’!”
Dr. Nazoum has taken us to his office and showed us his delightful sketches. He also removed some ordinary picture postcards from their frame to show us his wife’s picture hidden behind them.... “Twelve years of a life that might have been given to one’s family stolen from me for the rough and wandering life of war. Only a photograph. That is my married life.”
We also visited Nourredine Pasha’s father-in-law, a dervish living in a Tekké, and revived all my enthusiasm for their wonderful dancing to the weird piping flute; although these dervishes are, I believe, “contemplative.”
I was invited, when at the Assembly, by the Grand Tchelebi to visit Konia, the chief city of the dancing dervishes, and was much tempted to accept. I have never fully understood the “mystic dancing,” derived, as I was told, from our Psalmist’s command to “praise the Lord with dance and song”; but no one could fail to recognise the fascination of the weird rhythm to which the outspread skirts move with a haunting grace that is all their own; like gigantic mauve and brown poppies over the polished oak floor.
We were unfortunately too late to see much of Nourredine Pasha—the General was starting on his Inspection. My guide had been too polite to tell me my watch was slow. The General, however, found time to entrust me with greetings to General Harington, and to express more hopeful confidence in the future relations of our two countries. I am certainly glad I did not accept anyone else’s judgment of this kind and distinguished man. He is, however, a good ten years older than the other generals of the Pasha’s new army whom I have met. I am now quite accustomed to statesmen and generals of forty.
I think I must really have seen everything in Broussa, including the burnt hamlets of the countryside. I remember a school-house in this district, where the master had been paid in corn, and in which four generations of women, who gave us sweet goat’s milk, were now all living in one room, tastefully arranged with cushions. They had been swept off the face of the earth with the village in which they dwelt, by the Greeks.
But I must not forget the hospital, full of poor women—victims of the Greeks. If there were such sights at the French Front, I mercifully escaped seeing them; and here, for the first time, I realised what some of my sisters have had to endure since the spirit of war has come over us. Greek hatchets had been at work on Mme. Roufy Bey’s patients; and, whether in face or hip, back or leg, too many of these terrible wounds were festering, because it had been impossible to attend to them in time.
I remember the mother who once answered her little girl’s natural questions by telling her: “You just grew on my heart.” “How lovely,” cried the child, “is that why mothers all carry the babies so near their hearts?” “Yes, it is where we keep them.” Here was a poor Turkish mother whose little one had been shot as it lay in her arms!
Through this devastated area, and having seen the utter destitution of these people, I should have expected to find far greater bitterness towards the Greeks. But they are well treated in all the prison-camps, and never handled with brutality as they work on the roads. Yet they look rough and desperate, showing none of the resignation with which the Turk faces captivity, however ragged and tattered. These Greeks even seem afraid if a Christian woman speaks to them, although they own that their alarm does not come from either a guilty conscience or from terror of their enemies, but only reveals the broken spirit of men betrayed and alone. I feel, however, that to be always surrounded by the useless and horrible devastation you have yourself inflicted, must unnerve the most callous of human beings.
At about six o’clock on our last morning, an officer arrives to conduct us to the station. The train starts at 7-30, reaching Moudania at nine o’clock, where the boat may leave at 9-30, or any time it likes. It is a short and uneventful train journey, only relieved by a brisk trade in tea at our two stopping-places.
We find a high wind and rough seas at Moudania, and the boat has not yet arrived! There is plenty of time to drive to a unit of headquarters, where the officer’s mother (whom he had “smuggled” through from Constantinople) gives me coffee and cigarettes beside a welcome fire. We pass the historic house in which Peace was signed; one of the many examples in Anatolia of great achievements from small beginnings.
Moudania is, on the whole, more depressing than any of the miserable towns I have been over; and the officer is, certainly, to be congratulated on having secured the company of his mother.
It was about half-past six in the evening when we were summoned to embark; and there was no sign of the “special cabin” that had been promised me in this little cockle-shell of a boat, on which passengers, nevertheless, are divided according to class. For my part, I chose to travel second, as there was far more air; and, as we opened the door, the “poultry yard” gave us a hearty welcome! The women had taken their chickens and rabbits into their berths; the floor was strewn with corn and lettuce-leaves! As I disliked sharing my bed with poultry, I should be happier in the cold outside.
However, the first officer graciously gives up his cabin. It is tiny, by no means immaculate, and papered with cheerful postcards. But, in the place of honour, Queen of Beauty among the ladies of the Levant, hangs Gladys Cooper! I have never so much admired that lovely actress as when now she seemed smiling down at my mighty efforts to sleep in this tiniest of bunks that had been built for someone of half my length and width.
The little tub ultimately started at midnight, dancing over the waves to Constantinople, where Turkish passports are no protection, and I must now learn to depend on my credentials from England.
What is going to happen to me? Very possibly my passport will be taken from me, or endorsed with the grim words “not to return to England.”
My mission, indeed, was harmless, if not sanctioned. I have, honestly, endeavoured to see that England may be “a little better” understood by the Nationalists in Anatolia. But in fighting Prussianism, we have been slightly infected by that disease. It has crept into our legislation and our administration. In free England, Cæsar reigns. We can say, as the Turks say, “We have Prussia to thank for our distress.”